Way I Am
by leyton-is-lovee
Summary: just a one shotmost likely about Peyton before and after she finds Brooke at Lucas's house.


I own nothing—I'm pretty sure this will be a one-shot …let me know what you think.

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_I want this. You know, I wanna be here. I wanna have everything with you. I want it all. I want us._

Ladies be on the look out. This apparently is the newest form of a pick up line. Intended to make a girl swoon and forget all of her standards. Forget her walls. Forget her values even. That would work on most girls actually. That night, it didn't work on me.

I am someone who forever has her walls up. It doesn't matter who you are or where you're from. I'm a guarded person. I was born that way and I will more then likely die that way. It's a time like this though when I'm grateful that I'm so guarded.

You see, I'm sending out fair warning because that line above was used on me. At the time I freaked out completely and walked away. It was something I regretted everyday after that. I walked away from him because I had just gotten out of a…well I guess you could say serious relationship with his brother. And I knew that if we did go there, all the way there like he was saying that he would break down all of my walls and I would be vulnerable. So I basically said NO.

Fast forward a week. After talking with his best friend and my newly acquired friend Haley I decided what the hell. So that led me to where I am tonight. I went to his house. Professed my feelings. And was totally blissed out, watching the credits roll, and hearing the happy ending music. Until that was completely crushed by the seductive voice booming into his bedroom.

My best friend, well…former best friend was Brooke Davis. Self proclaimed party girl. We were like the ying to each other's yang. Different as day and night. She was the bubbly, cheery one. I was the moody, bitchy one. Many people never understood how we could actually be friends but they didn't know us. She was there for me when my mom died. We were eight and she didn't know how to handle grief, or a hysterical eight year old but she did. She got me through that time and because of it we're best friends. Looking back now though, when we entered the halls of Tree Hill High something came between us. I don't know what it was but it was there and we were never really the same. If we were she would have known my unspoken feelings for the boy that stood between us tonight.

Yes, she was the voice that came walking into the room. It was like watching an accident unfold, or a couple argue in the middle of a restaurant. You don't wanna watch but you can't help it. She came out in his sweatshirt…nothing else. It was obvious what they had done or were about to do. I felt my preverbal walls and the walls of his bedroom closing in around me. I knew they had gone out once but Brooke Davis wasn't a repeat offender. She got with a guy and that was that. Apparently I didn't know her that well anymore either.

I couldn't breathe, I couldn't speak. I felt my eyes burning and knew I had to get out of there. I turned to the door but stopped when he called my name.

I'm not sure what I was expecting. I didn't think he would actually tell me all the same things again. I didn't think he would tell Brooke to leave so that he and I could talk. I didn't think he would follow me as I walked away from him. No, I didn't think any of those things would happen. But I would be lying if I said I didn't want them to.

Now as I sit here on my bedroom floor I realized something. Lucas Scott was a boy like every other boy. He said things and tried to get into your heart but really wanted to get into your pants. He was worse then Nathan, my former boyfriend, Lucas's brother. Nathan never whispered sweet nothings and then tried to get me to sleep with him. No, he went right in for the kill. He never hid behind poets or authors or those damn squinty eyes. He was upfront and honest and he told me what he wanted when he wanted it. Regardless, Lucas Scott was a liar and a bastard. He and Brooke deserved each other.

I sighed tiredly as I looked around me. My sketches were thrown around the room. Some ripped in half. Some torn into pieces. Some burned. It didn't matter that I had put my heart into these drawings; I couldn't stand to look at them. They reminded me too much of him. Everything reminded me of him. Even being here in my room it felt like he was everywhere. He hadn't even been in my room, ever but it was like he was sitting on the bed or standing in the doorway or looking through my records. I closed my eyes and lifted my head to face the ceiling. I had yet to cry tonight and I wasn't about to now. As I brought my head back down I noticed it.

The blinking light on top of my computer. My webcam was on. Anyone who might have been watching had seen my emotional breakdown. I felt a relief in the fact that nobody did watch. Nobody at school ever talked about it. I was pretty sure only Nathan and Brooke watched it. Brooke obviously wasn't watching it and Nathan only watched it because he swore I was naked all the time. That's when it hit me. I suddenly knew why I felt Lucas's presence everywhere.

I scowled as I got up and marched forward. I looked into the screen and thought carefully. It was like I could see him sitting at his computer, Brooke asleep in his bed, he in his wife beater and boxers. I shook my head in disgust as I disconnected it and threw it in the garbage behind me.

That was officially part of something that I wasn't anymore. I had put myself out there for people in more ways then I noticed. This webcam was only one example. I had sat there at my computer countless times and simply let other people ogle at me. Let them fantasize about what I was doing, what I was wearing, just the fact that I was home alone. The other way was my sketches. Not many people would interpret them the way they were meant to be interpreted. Nathan had called them depressing and that he could certainly find a better way for me to use my time. Brooke called them scary and morbid. She had said that someone my age should be drawing happy things. I told her that someone like me didn't exactly have many things to be happy about.

The only person who ever really got them was Lucas. He could look at the paper and get everything I was trying to say. Of course, he wasn't supposed to see them. I freaked out when I saw him looking through the black book that meant the world to me. It also meant the world to me that he thought so highly of them.

I groaned as I plopped down on my bed. I had to stop thinking about him. I also knew that sleep wouldn't come. I stared at my ceiling and willed for it. I begged for my eyes to stay shut and for my mind to go blank. But it wouldn't. I pictured them. Moving together as one. Him whispering how beautiful she was or how glad he was that they were together. She would giggle and blush shyly. They would continue their movements until they were both sent over the edge. Climaxing as one. They would lie in bed together after. She would be protectively wrapped in his arms and every once and a while he would kiss her neck or cheek or ear. They would both drift off to sleep completely content.

After five minutes I felt my eyes burn. I knew it was coming. Sure, I could blame it on sleep deprivation but that wasn't the reason. I was crying because he had slipped away. I was too protective of myself and he found it too complicated. My chest heaved up and down and my pillows began to turn a deeper shade from my tears.

It's a time like this that I'm ungrateful for being so guarded.

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